Patios in Iwerne Minster

Edges are structure, not trim. A patio with nothing holding it in will spread at the open side and the joints will open with it. Edging is bedded and haunched in concrete, a coping caps a low retaining wall, and a kerb line separates paving from lawn. On a plot that steps, the retaining is designed first and the paving follows it.

Working next to an old wall. A nineteenth century garden wall in Iwerne Minster often sits on very little, so we do not dig a deep formation tight against its base and hope. The excavation is kept back or stepped, we do not bed paving hard into the fabric, and a gravel border between the wall and the slabs keeps splash off soft brick and flint while giving the falls somewhere to shed.

The dig. Old concrete, sunken flags, brick paviours, a raised bed built off the wall, roots and made ground come out first. We excavate to firm formation and the spoil is loaded to a grab lorry or a skip and leaves with us.

The sub base. Geotextile separator over soft ground, then MOT Type 1 in compacted layers of about 100mm rather than one deep lift given a single pass. That is the difference between a terrace that stays flat and one rocking within a few winters.

Porcelain and stone. Calibrated twenty millimetre porcelain is dense, takes almost no water and in a riven finish sits comfortably beside old brick. It goes on a full bed of mortar over a slurry primed back, never dabs. Sandstone is warm and forgiving but porous and greens in shade; limestone is quieter and marks with iron; granite is the hardest and the least likely to move; travertine is a poor choice for a Dorset winter. Hand cut stone varies in thickness so the bed levels it, calibrated stone is sawn to one depth.

Falls, levels and the damp course. The paving falls away from the building and finishes two courses below the DPC where the garden allows, as Approved Document C sets out. Water goes to a gully proved to run, a soakaway where the ground takes it, or a permeable build so the runoff stays on your own ground.

Jointing. Stone is hand pointed in a mortar matched to it, or given a brush in compound worked into a full joint; porcelain takes a grout made for dense units. Along a wall line, where the water concentrates, a short joint is always the first thing to go.

Repairs. Rebuilding a failed retaining edge, re-bedding rocking slabs, replacing cracked units, renewing washed out jointing and correcting falls on a terrace that ponds.

Thomas comes and looks at the garden, puts a level against the house and prices the patio himself. Behind an older house in Iwerne Minster the ground often rises or drops from the back door, and the damp proof course may be low or missing, so the levels are settled before anything else.

His written quote separates the dig and removing the spoil, the compacted sub-base, the falls and the route the water takes, edging and any steps, the paving itself, and pointing the joints.

Thomas answers your questions while it is dug, laid and pointed. Without side access to an Iwerne Minster garden, spoil goes out and materials come in by barrow along a route we agree, with boards over the lawn. We dig to firm ground, compact the sub-base, and bed each slab on a full bed of mortar rather than a few dabs. The garden is tidied every evening and the waste goes with us. If we hit roots, old footings or a drain, we send a photo and a price and wait for your answer.

A patio at ground level behind the house is normally permitted development, with nothing for building control. Taking down or rebuilding a boundary wall is covered by Planning Portal guidance on fences, gates and garden walls, and as the village is in the Iwerne Minster Conservation Area, a quick call to Dorset Council is worth making first. Work against a listed building may need listed building consent.

If a slab rocks, a step has dropped or the patio has turned slick with algae, ring rather than use the form. An Iwerne Minster patio on the north side of a house, or under trees, stays wet and green through the winter and becomes a real slip risk.

On the first visit we lift and re-bed the worst slabs, check whether the base under the rest has failed, and tell you what a proper repair involves. If a retaining edge or a sleeper wall has started leaning, ring now, because what is behind it keeps pushing. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. Should the phone ring out, we will return the call as soon as we can.

Call now: 07435 839745

The garden walls in this village are frequently the oldest thing on the plot, built in brick and flint with a lime mortar and very often standing on a shallow footing or none at all. They are also what makes the gardens look the way they do, and they are far more expensive to rebuild than to work around.

For a patio, the risk is to the wall itself. A deep excavation right against the base of an old wall takes away the ground supporting it, and walls have come down that way. Bedding paving hard against the brickwork traps water at the base of a wall that was built to dry out through its face, which brings on the frost damage and the crumbling mortar you can see on plenty of them already.

So in Iwerne Minster we design the patio to stop short of the wall. The excavation is stepped or held back, a stone margin or a narrow border sits between the slabs and the brickwork, and where a level change is wanted the retaining is built as its own structure rather than leaning the load onto something Victorian. Where a wall is shared with a neighbour, the party wall rules are worth reading before work starts. It costs a little more in setting out and it saves the wall.

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